Bharatanatyam

How Bollywood assigns classical dance only to female bodies considered worthy of the male gaze

The sudden introduction of classical dance in a film acts as a placeholder for several values held by the girl on screen, which the film cannot delve into deeply. It transforms into a proxy for everything the word 'sanskaari' can convey.

As Indian classical dancers go online in lockdown, an initiation of critical dialogue on the insularity of their craft

The pandemic has shown that it can subvert the long-held narratives around the practice of classical dances, to have a critical self-reflective voice, which has remained largely absent thus far.

How Amala Shankar witnessed the evolution of modern Indian dance and shaped it with her enthusiasm for life

The dance troupe led by Amala Shankar and her husband Uday Shankar was the central force of the cultural movement that introduced new dimensions in Indian dance and choreography

A robust caste discourse in Indian diaspora's classical dance practices is vital — and overdue

The Black Lives Matter movement must spark a reckoning within the diaspora Indian classical dance world with its own race and caste issues

Fashioning the dancing body: Tracing the evolution of the Bharatanatyam costume, from Devadasis to modern times

Throughout history, Bharatanatyam costumes have walked a tightrope between revealing and hiding the female form, reflecting the underlying conflict between the sensual and the spiritual as it evolved

To fill vital gaps in dance education, three educators address how a more critical practice could be achieved

The designers of Performance Practice (Dance), a Master's programme at the Ambedkar University, Delhi, have decided that it must neither be heavy on text or theory, nor should it focus on one specific form. It also encourages students to become the agents of their own learning, unlike more traditional one-on-one relationships with teachers, which tend to seep into the students' personal lives

'Nothing is isolated from dance' : An interview with Bharatanatyam artiste Lata Surendra

Lata Surendra discusses how a dancer can bring a performance to life, transcend the confines of the stage and the auditorium and transform the dance into a visual prayer simply through the act of reading and understanding the nuances of emotion and expression found in literature, poetry and ancient texts.

At a time of nationwide protests, India's classical artists are missing a culture of dissent, and this needs fixing

An absent culture of dissent is not a new feature in classical dance, given that the relationship of classical dancers with the society is heavily mediated by the state’s cultural machinery. As societies from across the world are leaning on their youth for leading the fight for a better tomorrow, there might be no better moment than now for the classical dances to reflect on what an education in classical dance is truly meant to serve.

Classical dance and appropriation: How to think about a field whose foundations rest on cultural violence

Given that classical dance entered the upper caste communities through the process of appropriation (first by denying the hereditary dancers their right to perform, then adopting the same dance tradition while continuing to deny them the right to perform) it might seem rather obvious that the present day classical dancers should be aware and respond to this past that they continue to benefit from. The reality however couldn’t be further away from this.

At Kashmiri Pandit gathering in London, British Conservative MP says India has sovereign right on entirety of Jammu and Kashmir

One of Britain's most outspoken MPs on the Kashmir issue Bob Blackman has called on Pakistan to leave Pakistan-occupied Kashmir, asserting that India has a sovereign right over the entire region.